Resurrection Now

There’s a beautiful modern icon by Kelly Latimore that depicts the interaction between the risen Jesus and Mary Magdalene in today’s Gospel from John. She thinks he’s the gardener, as John reports, so the artist cleverly portrays Jesus reaching down to show Mary a few tiny seedlings bursting from the ground. In fact, there are signs of life all around the empty tomb: flowering plants, eggs resting in a bird’s nest, the first rays of the Easter morning sun peeking over the horizon. It’s as if the Resurrection of Our Lord is about more than just the body of Jesus.

Of course, the mysterious events of that first Easter are at the very center of the Christian faith. And sincere people have come to all sorts of conclusions about the claim that Jesus, the crucified Messiah, somehow rose from death to give his followers the hope of life beyond it. “Death no longer has dominion over him,” as the Apostle Paul puts it, and “we will certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his.” But if death’s dominion is seemingly universal, and if the evidence of resurrection is limited to a single case, if that, then how can I possibly keep the faith?

I suppose it depends on what you mean by faith. Hear how Pastor Robin Meyers describes the movement that rose up around the risen Jesus. The following excerpts are from Meyers’ book Saving God from Religion: A Minister’s Search for Faith in a Skeptical Age, which members of the congregation read together as a spiritual practice during the season of Lent:

[pp. 102-5, 186]

Friends, the resurrection is not an isolated event that took place 2,000 years ago in a quiet garden near Jerusalem. Resurrection is taking place now. Wherever the newly baptized are swept up into abundant life through water and God’s word of promise, there is resurrection. Wherever ordinary saints love their neighbors in defiance of suffering and death, there is resurrection. Wherever healing and hope take root in unlikely circumstances, there is resurrection. Wherever the living Christ calls his beloved by name and sends us, like Mary, with renewed courage and a sense of purpose, there is resurrection.

Christ is risen! Christ is risen indeed! And so are we. Alleluia!